The former House speaker once led a revolution, but Republicans may look for someone new in 2012

Newt Gingrich's campaign hinges on whether he can convince Republican voters his career didn't peak 17 years ago.

The former House speaker, who formally launches his presidential campaign today, sat atop the Republican Party in 1994. Beginning as a backbench congressman from Georgia, Gingrich engineered the first GOP takeover of the House in 40 years, becoming a hero to fellow Republican conservatives.

That was followed by a downward spiral that included political mutinies in the House and personal disgrace that led to the breakup of his home. Yet after leaving office in 1999, he once again engineered a remarkable turnaround, building a multi-million dollar private-sector empire to promote conservative principles and emerging as an elder statesman on the TV, book, and lecture circuit.

It's been a remarkably full career for the 67-year-old Gingrich, first elected in 1978. But for many voters, that's the problem: Isn't it time for someone else to lead the fight?

"I think his biggest challenge is being relevant this late into the 21st century," said Rich Galen, a spokesman for Gingrich's political operation in the mid-1990s. "Remember, he engineered the Gingrich Revolution in 1994. For a lot of voters, you may as well be talking about FDR."

No less a power broker than South Carolina Gov. Nikki Haley, whose endorsement could prove pivotal in that early primary state, has said recently the ex-congressman must prove his ideas are still "relevant." That's not a question looming over a field of relatively fresh-faced rivals, such as former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney or former Minnesota Gov. Tim Pawlenty, who made their mark in this century.

The paradox for Gingrich: Conservatives almost universally agree he's an ideas factory and formidable strategist, but that doesn't mean they want him to be president. Sales of Gingrich's latest book don't necessarily translate into campaign volunteers--or votes.

Polls underscore the challenge: Despite having nearly the highest name identification in the GOP field (84 percent, according to Gallup), Gingrich lags behind top-tier contenders. A late April Gallup poll reported only 6 percent of Republicans backed the former speaker, less than half of the number who supported Romney and former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee.

According to another Gallup survey, one quarter of Republicans who know Gingrich have an unfavorable opinion of him--the same percentage who view former GOP vice presidential nominee Sarah Palin unfavorably.

"He's been around a long time, and been in the news and maintained a very high profile," said Warren Tompkins, a longtime South Carolina GOP operative. "The fact he's not polling better would indicate that something is holding him back, or it's a sign of weakness."

One possible explanation: Gingrich's mixed record as Congress's GOP leader. His ham-handed handling of budget negotiations resulted in a government shutdown that was widely blamed on Republicans. Gingrich was famously caricatured as a "Cry Baby" on the front page of the New York Daily News. The episode gave President Clinton an upper-hand in budget negotiations and helped him to eventual reelection. Revelations that Gingrich had engaged in an extra-marital affair with a young staff member while excoriating President Clinton for his dalliance with White House intern Monica Lewinsky forced him to step down as speaker. Gingrich's checkered marital past--the congressman has been divorced twice--is not likely to impress social conservatives, a key GOP constituency.

Gingrich's role as the leader of a revolution that fizzled could make him seem out of step with Republican voters who regard their tea party-led victories in 2010 as a rebirth of the conservative movement.

"It's proven that he was a failure as speaker," said Tompkins. He sees Gingrich as a "creature of Washington" at a time when conservatives are looking outside the Beltway, adding: "What makes you think he's going to get it right this time?"

For his supporters, Gingrich's record is an asset, not a weakness. He can tout a list of accomplishments as speaker: Working with President Clinton to pass welfare reform and slowing the growth of federal government spending in the 1990s. Both achievements are noteworthy in a GOP primary that will focus on government spending and changing the country's entitlement system.

Gingrich is the only candidate with budget-cutting experience at the federal level, said Gingrich spokesman Rick Tyler.

"I don't want to speak about any of the other candidates--they're all fine candidates--but none of them have worked on the federal level to balance budgets," he said. "None of them have worked for tax cuts on the national level. Running a state just isn't the same as working on the federal level."

The ex-speaker's long tenure in GOP politics isn't a hindrance, said Tyler, because it will help him create the clearest contrast with President Obama. "Why should we make the same mistake the Democrats did and nominate a novice?" he asked, referring to Obama, not halfway through his first Senate term when he won his party's nomination. "Why should we answer a novice with a novice?"

Galen warned that Gingrich can never be counted out, and added that his deep Rolodex of well-financed supporters could give him a major fundraising jolt early in the campaign. But Galen said his former boss's deep ties to the conservative movement can't erase the sense that his campaign is a long-shot.

"I think his time has come and gone," he said. "There may have been a time when he could have [run for president], and been successful. I just think there are other people who have a different way of presenting their views that I think will be attractive to more people."

Most Popular

Should you drink more coffee? Should you take melatonin? Can you train yourself to need less sleep? A physician’s guide to sleep in a stressful age.

During residency, Iworked hospital shifts that could last 36 hours, without sleep, often without breaks of more than a few minutes. Even writing this now, it sounds to me like I’m bragging or laying claim to some fortitude of character. I can’t think of another type of self-injury that might be similarly lauded, except maybe binge drinking. Technically the shifts were 30 hours, the mandatory limit imposed by the Accreditation Council for Graduate Medical Education, but we stayed longer because people kept getting sick. Being a doctor is supposed to be about putting other people’s needs before your own. Our job was to power through.

The shifts usually felt shorter than they were, because they were so hectic. There was always a new patient in the emergency room who needed to be admitted, or a staff member on the eighth floor (which was full of late-stage terminally ill people) who needed me to fill out a death certificate. Sleep deprivation manifested as bouts of anger and despair mixed in with some euphoria, along with other sensations I’ve not had before or since. I remember once sitting with the family of a patient in critical condition, discussing an advance directive—the terms defining what the patient would want done were his heart to stop, which seemed likely to happen at any minute. Would he want to have chest compressions, electrical shocks, a breathing tube? In the middle of this, I had to look straight down at the chart in my lap, because I was laughing. This was the least funny scenario possible. I was experiencing a physical reaction unrelated to anything I knew to be happening in my mind. There is a type of seizure, called a gelastic seizure, during which the seizing person appears to be laughing—but I don’t think that was it. I think it was plain old delirium. It was mortifying, though no one seemed to notice.

Why the ingrained expectation that women should desire to become parents is unhealthy

In 2008, Nebraska decriminalized child abandonment. The move was part of a "safe haven" law designed to address increased rates of infanticide in the state. Like other safe-haven laws, parents in Nebraska who felt unprepared to care for their babies could drop them off in a designated location without fear of arrest and prosecution. But legislators made a major logistical error: They failed to implement an age limitation for dropped-off children.

Within just weeks of the law passing, parents started dropping off their kids. But here's the rub: None of them were infants. A couple of months in, 36 children had been left in state hospitals and police stations. Twenty-two of the children were over 13 years old. A 51-year-old grandmother dropped off a 12-year-old boy. One father dropped off his entire family -- nine children from ages one to 17. Others drove from neighboring states to drop off their children once they heard that they could abandon them without repercussion.

His paranoid style paved the road for Trumpism. Now he fears what’s been unleashed.

Glenn Beck looks like the dad in a Disney movie. He’s earnest, geeky, pink, and slightly bulbous. His idea of salty language is bullcrap.

The atmosphere at Beck’s Mercury Studios, outside Dallas, is similarly soothing, provided you ignore the references to genocide and civilizational collapse. In October, when most commentators considered a Donald Trump presidency a remote possibility, I followed audience members onto the set of The Glenn Beck Program, which airs on Beck’s website, theblaze.com. On the way, we passed through a life-size replica of the Oval Office as it might look if inhabited by a President Beck, complete with a portrait of Ronald Reagan and a large Norman Rockwell print of a Boy Scout.

Since the end of World War II, the most crucial underpinning of freedom in the world has been the vigor of the advanced liberal democracies and the alliances that bound them together. Through the Cold War, the key multilateral anchors were NATO, the expanding European Union, and the U.S.-Japan security alliance. With the end of the Cold War and the expansion of NATO and the EU to virtually all of Central and Eastern Europe, liberal democracy seemed ascendant and secure as never before in history.

Under the shrewd and relentless assault of a resurgent Russian authoritarian state, all of this has come under strain with a speed and scope that few in the West have fully comprehended, and that puts the future of liberal democracy in the world squarely where Vladimir Putin wants it: in doubt and on the defensive.

The same part of the brain that allows us to step into the shoes of others also helps us restrain ourselves.

You’ve likely seen the video before: a stream of kids, confronted with a single, alluring marshmallow. If they can resist eating it for 15 minutes, they’ll get two. Some do. Others cave almost immediately.

This “Marshmallow Test,” first conducted in the 1960s, perfectly illustrates the ongoing war between impulsivity and self-control. The kids have to tamp down their immediate desires and focus on long-term goals—an ability that correlates with their later health, wealth, and academic success, and that is supposedly controlled by the front part of the brain. But a new study by Alexander Soutschek at the University of Zurich suggests that self-control is also influenced by another brain region—and one that casts this ability in a different light.

Modern slot machines develop an unbreakable hold on many players—some of whom wind up losing their jobs, their families, and even, as in the case of Scott Stevens, their lives.

On the morning of Monday, August 13, 2012, Scott Stevens loaded a brown hunting bag into his Jeep Grand Cherokee, then went to the master bedroom, where he hugged Stacy, his wife of 23 years. “I love you,” he told her.

Stacy thought that her husband was off to a job interview followed by an appointment with his therapist. Instead, he drove the 22 miles from their home in Steubenville, Ohio, to the Mountaineer Casino, just outside New Cumberland, West Virginia. He used the casino ATM to check his bank-account balance: $13,400. He walked across the casino floor to his favorite slot machine in the high-limit area: Triple Stars, a three-reel game that cost $10 a spin. Maybe this time it would pay out enough to save him.

“Well, you’re just special. You’re American,” remarked my colleague, smirking from across the coffee table. My other Finnish coworkers, from the school in Helsinki where I teach, nodded in agreement. They had just finished critiquing one of my habits, and they could see that I was on the defensive.

I threw my hands up and snapped, “You’re accusing me of being too friendly? Is that really such a bad thing?”

“Well, when I greet a colleague, I keep track,” she retorted, “so I don’t greet them again during the day!” Another chimed in, “That’s the same for me, too!”

Unbelievable, I thought. According to them, I’m too generous with my hellos.

When I told them I would do my best to greet them just once every day, they told me not to change my ways. They said they understood me. But the thing is, now that I’ve viewed myself from their perspective, I’m not sure I want to remain the same. Change isn’t a bad thing. And since moving to Finland two years ago, I’ve kicked a few bad American habits.

A report will be shared with lawmakers before Trump’s inauguration, a top advisor said Friday.

Updated at 2:20 p.m.

President Obama asked intelligence officials to perform a “full review” of election-related hacking this week, and plans will share a report of its findings with lawmakers before he leaves office on January 20, 2017.

Deputy White House Press Secretary Eric Schultz said Friday that the investigation will reach all the way back to 2008, and will examine patterns of “malicious cyber-activity timed to election cycles.” He emphasized that the White House is not questioning the results of the November election.

Asked whether a sweeping investigation could be completed in the time left in Obama’s final term—just six weeks—Schultz replied that intelligence agencies will work quickly, because the preparing the report is “a major priority for the president of the United States.”

A professor of cognitive science argues that the world is nothing like the one we experience through our senses.

As we go about our daily lives, we tend to assume that our perceptions—sights, sounds, textures, tastes—are an accurate portrayal of the real world. Sure, when we stop and think about it—or when we find ourselves fooled by a perceptual illusion—we realize with a jolt that what we perceive is never the world directly, but rather our brain’s best guess at what that world is like, a kind of internal simulation of an external reality. Still, we bank on the fact that our simulation is a reasonably decent one. If it wasn’t, wouldn’t evolution have weeded us out by now? The true reality might be forever beyond our reach, but surely our senses give us at least an inkling of what it’s really like.

We can all agree that Millennials are the worst. But what is a Millennial? A fight between The New York Times and Slate inspired us to try and figure that out.

This article is from the archive of our partner .

We can all agree that Millennials are the worst. But what is a Millennial? A fight between The New York Times and Slate inspired us to try and figure that out.

After the Times ran a column giving employers tips on how to deal with Millennials (for example, they need regular naps) (I didn't read the article; that's from my experience), Slate's Amanda Hess pointed out that the examples the Times used to demonstrate their points weren't actually Millennials. Some of the people quoted in the article were as old as 37, which was considered elderly only 5,000 short years ago.

The age of employees of The Wire, the humble website you are currently reading, varies widely, meaning that we too have in the past wondered where the boundaries for the various generations were drawn. Is a 37-year-old who gets text-message condolences from her friends a Millennial by virtue of her behavior? Or is she some other generation, because she was born super long ago? (Sorry, 37-year-old Rebecca Soffer who is a friend of a friend of mine and who I met once! You're not actually that old!) Since The Wire is committed to Broadening Human Understanding™, I decided to find out where generational boundaries are drawn.